Does The Stock Market Influence Your Vintage Purchases?
 

The title says it all. For me, I look at the stock market and might not spend quite as much if it is tanking. And I only have a very small fraction of money in it.
And a newer pick up..

As money gets tighter, I hesitate to buy bigger cards.

My finances are more or less fixed, even though I still work. Nothing is tied to the stock market. My being able to find disposable money to purchase vintage cards is 100% affected by how high card prices (continue to) go. Thankfully, I have Ruth, Cobb, Mantle, etc., from earlier days when I could afford them. I am not able or even willing to pay thousands of dollars for baseball cards.

Over the years I have found that during economic downturns, not saying we are in a recession, don't think that will happen until 2023, these come down the least in comparison to other names, these also seem to go up the most when times are good.

Ruth
Cobb
Jackie
Willie and Mantle

In recessions people will not pay up for low grade non graded cards, they're coming down considerably.

I would buy that card for only one reason: SYRACUSE, N. Y., which is where I am from :D

Yes, I buy more when prices are down, I sell when prices are up

Not that I know of, but probably.

Stock market, no. Economy and inflation, yes.

This year, I have seen more "buyers" become "sellers" than ever before.

Yes. If the stock market is tanking, I’ m not buying cards. I’m buying stocks.

Great Point !!

I voted yes.

The more the market goes down the more I'm putting in the market instead of hobbies.

No simple answer from me.

i don't invest in equities or baseball cards. They are different investments. I am getting ready to plunk money into equities once they stabilize in what I think will be a bear market.

I never stop looking for rare cards. I never stop looking for bargains on blue chip players. When it pops up, you have to buy it, or you will regret it.

If the stock market is tanking and there are concerns with recession, I am going to sell cards into it because cards tend to lag the stock market by 9-12 months. I know that after riding the tiger the last 40 years. So, now is the time to sell off the chaff in the collection and inventory. The card market is red hot right now, which means people haven't internalized the pending situation. Time to take advantage.

As things get tougher, first to go are the speculators who will just dump and move on. Next are the dealers who have to get cash flow out of inventory. Followed by the speculators who will hold a bad deal too long and finally capitulate. Then comes the collectors who lose jobs and whose businesses tank and need to sell to make their monthly nut. Once those collectors sell, the fat has been rendered out of the market and it is time to buy. Hard. I am holding cash from card sales waiting for that opportunity. I have a long list of cards that I really like at 60% of recent prlces. I expect many of them to fall to that level over the next 9-12 months.

It's a lot more bloodless than it used to be for me, but that was before the Hobby became the Industry.

Stocks have nothing to do with cards period

The data suggests otherwise. Gyrations of the stock market might have nothing to do with collecting habits, to be sure, but in terms of prices, there is a correlation.

I don't doubt it, but would be curious to see that data, where are you getting it?

To me they are 2 different forms of fun/investment.

When the market is down I do add strategically in the market to add to some positions I have at at better cost basis.

The card collecting is a hobby/very long term investment. As a result I treat these funds as discretionary funds and buy as i have the funds available and see something that I want to buy

I have a budget each year for what I can spend on my set build, this is my discretionary fund. The budget stays relatively flat year over year. If the stock is down I invest more, if the card market is down I can afford to buy more with my budget at that time but the budget doesn’t increase.
When my Banks rookie is up 500+% in 6 years it’s a plus but my collection is just a hobby, it isn’t part of my retirement account. So no the stock market doesn’t affect my vintage purchases.

+1

Consumer behavior is funny, when asset values are rising we get FOMO and act irrational. Down markets, that psychology is the opposite, consumer spending grinds to a halt when RE, equities get hammered. House appraised at 100K less, investments down another 200K, and cost to carry any debt up significantly? Turns out we aren't as rich as we thought we were.

Bottom is about to fall out on a wide range of assets, should be very interesting to see how the hobby reacts.

Personally, I will be a buyer, following a number of cards that are 20-30% off peak and hoping they go lower.

Boom

There isn't any change in my hobby behavior because my hobby spending is probably less than 2% of our net monthly income, and my collection is probably about 1% of our net worth. I grew up with middle class, but frugal, parents and I am pretty much the same. I've never spent more than $400 on a card and, even then, it took herculean effort to open my wallet.

I did fairly well sitting on cash and pushing it into equities in the COVID crash. My expectations is, like others, we are entering a bear market as the Fed grapples with (hopefully) transitory inflation, and I'll do the same again. With 8-10 years to retirement, I can ride a long term bear market.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/09/infl...vey-shows.html

Consumers grew a little more optimistic about inflation in April, though they still expect to be spending considerably more in the year ahead, a Federal Reserve survey released Monday shows.

Inflation expectations over the next year fell to a median 6.3%, a 0.3 percentage-point decrease from the record high in March, according to data going back to June 2013. On a three-year basis, expectations rose 0.2 percentage point to 3.9%, which itself is 0.3 percentage point off the record.

The data comes with 12-month inflation in March running at 8.5%, the highest level since December 1981. April consumer prices are due to be reported on Wednesday.


Lets see what is released on Wednesday.

I do expect more card price volatility this summer, ultimately trending downward. I think for the average collectors, cards are not going to be a priority for the next few months.

Cash Will Be King at this Years National, Bank On It !!!! Especially come middle Saturday.

Get your shopping list ready.

Cash is king especially at this years National, a lot of dealers are over levered and possibly underwater on cards.

I am a small player in the t206 market. I look for good value in the cards I buy and if I get a HoF for under $150 I'm happy.

Limited in budget, I have followed others advice of buying centered and " overpaying today is underpaying tomorrow."

I have done very well the past 4 years as a result of what I purchased.

The big names in the t206 series are way out of reach for me, however moderate HoF's are within budget....for now. I have a nice collection of what would as 1's, graded and ungraded.

All I collect are t206's, not building the set, but it is all I will buy.

50 cards and growing.....

In decades past, when I used to go to card shows regularly, I found that dealers were ready to make deals on the last day, just before packing up. And cash money talked. Many of my cards were bought that way. My 58 Mantle comes immediately to mind. There are many, many others.

My investment was staying in the Navy and getting a 65% pension. Totally unaffected by the stock market.

100% affected by the price of cards. I will never pay thousands of dollars for baseball cards.

Me as well and I hope we are right..

Decades worth of data and history will prove it to be so.

I think the party of the last three years is over. It will be a buyers market for a while.

Peter, when I was actively writing a price guide for boxing cards I amassed data every year for the new edition. I noticed that in the Great Recession, the mess really got under way in the summer of 2008 as the real estate market imploded but boxing auctions still did really well into 2009. Then things started to fizzle out. I saw a bottom of the market in Fall 2010, and it was stable for a few years then slowly built back. That tracked with my experiences buying cards for the PC and trying to sell in 1990 and 2001.

I bought all the way up, and I'll buy all the way down.

I LIKE it!

Well, the art market remains strong despite the recent pullback of stocks. Yesterday, Andy Warhol's painting of Marilyn Monroe fetched nearly $200 million at auction.

Interesting you brought this up. While it did set a record, some estimates had it going for $400 million.

When interest rates go up many of the ultra wealthy hide out in treasuries...way less risk. When interest rates are low big money hedges in collectables.

I have no idea how the broad art market is doing, but don't find these types of "best of the best" items very representative. Same for cards - almost the whole basketball card market is down off ATH's substantially, as in cards that were selling for 20K, now selling for 4K .But if a rare / desirable ultra high end card came up it would smash records. There really are two hobbies, at least when it comes to cards.

The way I see it, if the tumbling of my stock portfolio (and boy is it tumbling...) changes my financial situation to where I need to pull back on my discretionary expenses, then I have spent too much on toys and been grossly irresponsible. X money goes to savings and necessary stable expenses, Y money goes to investment, Z money is set aside for me to waste on cardboard pictures of men. The momentary up/down doesn't affect card budget because my investments are for the long term mostly and I don't take so much out of savings that ups and downs affect my ability to pay the bills.

It might change what cards specifically I buy, as prices shift, but they shift up and down constantly and this is always broadly true.

Pre '86 hoops is not down 80% from the highs. And as I've mentioned before, '86 to '88 Fleer and modern basketball were the cards that had some of the most insane pandemic gains beforehand. So it's standard market action for those to have the biggest % drops once that mania subsides.

The comment earlier about so many more buyers becoming sellers lately doesn't make sense to me either. Prices for quality vintage have mostly held steady for a year now (obviously at levels that are still substantially higher than pre-pandemic times), and the BIN supply on ebay for vintage in general still only contains mostly overpriced items, and no more than were available when the recent boom was in full swing.

I'm not saying everything is currently amazing in the card world or assuming that things will stay this healthy. But some of you guys really have the most negative spin possible, especially for a marketplace that still looks strong so far (and has done incredible in just a two year stretch)

Good points, John. The 'market' really isn't monolithic. I think the slash and burn FOMO days are ending. Even then, different items will react differently. I have no qualms about Babe Ruth cards. Shohei Ohtani not so much.

Greg, I hear that! I've been on a kill-eat basis ever since my daughter announced a intention to go to medical school. That's why I run an active card business: gotta raise cash for my collecting completely outside the mainstream of my earnings.

"There really are two hobbies, when it comes to cards."

Amen!

I don't have a ton of stock but have some. And when the stock market is sucking this bad, as it has in the last week, I just don't feel like spending as much money on cards. (unless it's one I really need!)
.

Spoken like a true collector.

Sorry but the overall marketplace is not strong, the cards that trade the most are trending down. Lots of examples pre 86, and almost every modern BBK is way down save for the super rare stuff.

Case in point, Dr. J PSA9 RC peak 57k, last two sold under 20K. I follow hockey. Gretzky, Lemieux, Yzerman RC's all way off highs. Lemieux RC is a key card, top 10-20 in the hobby and is more then 50% off highs.

Broadly the market is getting crumpled, even if some segments and highly desirable cards are trading well. And IMO we have only started, based on the fact most don't seem to understand what is going on.....broadly.

And FWIW, I'm not a card investor so I'm neutral on this stuff. If anything I see this as highly positive, I don't want my hobby to be a speculators paradise. But it feels like 1990 to me, things will likely get much worse (or better depending on your perspective) from here on as trillions evaporates from financial markets.

Another one is getting it +1

Only thing I will say is you can't use major auction houses as a gauge on the current state of collector grade cards in this market. That's all AH's are White Collar Buyers
EBAY BST IN PERSON SHOWS are mostly Blue Collar Collectors. Just my two cents

Yup, same here. When times are good, FOMO kicks in. When sentiment changes, demand evaporates quicker then it came on. I always use the example of the 90s, when we had Dads fighting over cases of Upper Deck french hockey at 300 a box. 12 months later you couldn't give these away and they likely never reach the price they hit in 1990. Obviously vintage is a completely different beast, but when demand leaves a market, look out, prices on highly available, widely traded stuff can go to near zero.

The concerning thing in the hobby I am seeing is this phrase:

"Refocusing/Retooling/Adjusting my collection"

I have seen that phrase used in 2022 more than any time in recent memory.

Agree…Cash at this years National On Saturday and Sunday May Hold a lot more buying power than the past two years, across the board. It’s my only chance on big cards I’m hunting….I can’t beat a guy who’s willing to go to the moon in REA Or Heritage but I may have a shot at the show with Cold Hard Cash due to the fear settling in….idk I could be wrong but at least it gives me some hope.

Those statements to me sound like less buyers/less demand.

30 years in the Stock Market does not influence me at all, just living with in my means, collecting vintage cards

It has yet to effect asking prices here on N54


Zing!

I see the National very differently. If the stock market continues to shit the bed for the next 3 months, I think buying anything good at a reasonable price will be next to impossible. The cards that sold at their peak for $10,000 but are now available for $4,000 will be generously marked down to $9,000. Many dealers will ignore current realities hoping to find buyers who are ignorant of changes in the market.
There was a chain store on the east coast whose tag line for years was “an informed buyer is our best customer”. I’ve yet to see any instance where that was actually true. Best customer is usually an uninformed rich drunk guy.

It could very well be. All it takes is one dealer with the card I need looking to deal. Many like you say above will still be high and greedy but if one has the card I need and is will to take a good amount of cash at a reasonable level I’m thrilled. I’ll never have this chance in REA or Heritable for the card I want. Fingers crossed

Depends on the card and seller of course. If you are looking for something that is not a Goudey or other sexy well known “Investment grade” piece you stand a much better chance. In any event, the hunt for ones white
Whale(s) is one of the coolest most fun aspects of the hobby. And nowhere is that search more fun than the National. Good luck.

Thanks Steve !!

Was this Syms? Man I havent thought about them in a decade!

Yep, pretty sure it was them.

Syms Discount Clothing : “Where an educated consumer is our best buyer.”

I bought my first tie at a Syms Discount Mens Store in Northern Virginia.

Ha. I got that a little off. But same sentiment. Thought it was for a mattress store.

In Texas that exact slogan was used for many years by Men's Warehouse... (according to Google it was in fact Sy Syms)

https://www.menswearhouse.com/

.

There is a fascinating two part podcast series on the art market from Freakanomics. I highly recommend giving it a listen.

I do not have much in the market but when Wall St starts to correct I change my card spending habits because I know most people will get nervous and change their habits. In the bigger picture with gas remaining high, interest rates going up and inflation staring us in the face, I think we will see prices drop (continue to drop) on the cards which are bought by the average collector. At the very least demand will suffer. The cost of living is way up and cards do not feed you when you are hungry. The extremely wealthy collector/investor might pull back a bit but I could still see record prices being paid for elite type material.

On the other hand let's look to March of 2020. DJIA went from almost 30K to roughly 19K and did not recover until Dec 2020. During that time we were all locked down being told Covid would kill us all and card values went up. Further the hobby got the attention of lots of new people who jumped in with both feet. Yes the feds were tossing money at people and many found themselves unable to travel, entertain, etc but I am not sure how much of that influenced prices or to what degree it was a factor.

Then again, clearly some not particularly rare or especially high-graded cards can still go for inexplicably high prices at auction: https://bid.robertedwardauctions.com...?itemid=106007

Is that paper loss or paper adhesion below "collector" on the back? You can see the red on the front too, on the border at that spot.

Yes a lot of key cards are 40-60% off their highs. My point was that 80% is quite an exaggeration for most. And comparing current levels to the top of a mania's very short-lived bubble prices is always going to make "down x% from the high" look awful, despite how it's the norm for what happens during and after any huge boom.

Like I mentioned before, except for late '80s hoops, the card market has stabilized pretty well for the last year (at price levels that average around 150-200% above where they were before the pandemic).

That is not "crumpled", and yes it is strong market action overall since the pandemic began.

The Lemieux rookie that you brought up (as an example of things supposedly falling apart in general) is actually a good snapshot of what's right in the marketplace. The OPC in PSA 7 was 200 before the pandemic, 1500 for a very short time during the early '21 peak, and has stayed at 700 for the past year. If you see that performance as a problem, then you're not being realistic about how well any market can usually do in the long run.

And again, I am not saying that everything will be fine from here. Things could collapse in the world of cards, Wall Street, or elsewhere (obviously a lot of economic risks out there at the moment). TBH, the current housing market reminds me of the irrational highs from around 2005. But it hasn't happened yet. And if someone can so easily prognosticate about that going forward, then more power to them!

So at what point does our hobby market correct, if it does? Maybe another 20% drop in the stock market? I have seen my savings go down a good bit lately.... fortunately I have very little, relative to other resources, in the market.
.

Leon my take is this is we have two different markets in the vintage card industry

1. White Collar Big Ticket Items in REA, Memory Lane, Heritage ect. My belief is the bigger items in those auctions are controlled by white collar investors. Many of the cards I’ve noticed over the past two and a half years have played musical chairs from one house to the next in a relatively quick time frame 2-4 months.
To me these investors are less affected by inflation and a stock market downturn.

2. Blue Collar Middle and Lower Grade Private Collectors at In Person BST or direct eBay sales have corrected and will only go lower especially on the lower grade pieces. It’s my belief that the high inflation affecting the normal blue collar middle class guy is hindering their buying.

The Rick Get Richer, The Poor Get Poorer, And the Middle Class Pays May More and Buys Less and Less Discretionary items…

Actually, I found that in the recession the cheap stuff remained a steady seller. People need to feed their cardboard habits.

Whether you are a collector, investor, dealer or speculator, I think it is human nature difficult to accept a loss on a card and many will hold on, hoping for a rebound and refusing to lower their prices.
Also, I feel there will be far less trading of high value modern, now so popular at shows. Nobody wants to be the last holding the bag.

From an article posted today, Elon Musk recommends buying physical things in this environment. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-...180112580.html

As I posted earlier in this thread, the market was never more in peril (in recent times) than in March 2020 when the whole world shut down. DJIA dropped to 19K and took the rest of the year to come back. Things might not look great short term but look at what cards and other tangibles did when the DJIA took a massive hit. The DJIA is no where close to 19K however that is far from the only measure of a strong or weak economy.

And sure it does not feel good when the stock market is down, even if you have no money in it, because enough people do who start spending differently, but this too shall pass. If you are long cards and long the stock market you are gonna be just fine.

Long the right cards. I wouldn't be holding those 2019 Prizms.

Talked to a longtime collector this morning. With the bear market we are in, he is worrying less and less about buying cards and more about putting money in investments.

I am interested to see if the stock market decreases reflect in the card community, especially this summer. Might be some deals out there.

hi dont tell that to the folks going to the national lol

I Remember over the Past few Years Many Had Sellers Remorse. Now from what I’m seeing more and more having Buyers Remorse, especially on those modern Jordans, Henderson Rookies, and Jeter Sp's. A lot of modern is tied to Crypto and you know where that is....fallen angel.

Although IMO way over inflated in AH's over the past two years, the growth so quickly at such levels just did not make sense, Centered High End Graded Quality, Ruth, Cobb, Jackie, Mantle, and Mays always seem to hold.
Collectors never want to sell these that's why the go down the least in bad times and rise the most in good times.

I feel that, with the rise in interest rates, many speculators who have used their bank LOC's and overdrafts to buy high value cards may be over leveraged and are starting to feel pain.

rare vintage still seems strong
 

In the last 2 weeks I have received strong offers on 2 of my most valuable cards. I did not sell, I can't (or won't be able to afford to) replace them.

I did not even list them for sale.

The new stuff is getting spanked. When I was a kid and I'd open a pack of '80 Topps I'd be thrilled to get a George Brett, Rod Carew, or Nolan Ryan because, get this... they'd be worth a whole 50 cents! Maybe Nolan was a buck. Now new cards sell for 6 or 7 figures, reminds me of the dot com stocks some 20 years ago. BE CAREFUL

For a strong enough price I will not only sell any card I have, I will carry it to your car for you.

Man this will be one interesting National if the market keeps its downward trajectory. Will the hobby be back to pre covid bubble prices? Will prices sink even lower, erasing gains over the last 5+ years?

If Adam is right and the card market lags 9-12 months behind, it will be very hard to figure out what prices to both buy and sell. There will be lots of price frothiness in the marketplace. I think as a buyer you have to try and buy with an outward price projection of that 9-12 month lag time to try and price in the downward trend. As a seller you hope the quality and or rarity of your item is enough to get you something as close to bubble pricing as possible.

I think both stock market and card prices have quite a ways to go down before stabilizing.

There are now definite buying opportunities. I sense a lot of “panic”. I can’t tell you how many collectors are now doing the following:

Retooling/refocusing their collection
Getting out of the hobby
Selling below comps
Selling collections to move into other investments

Definitely an opportunity now and probably in the near future.

The problem is the good stuff is going to go deep under....the people that have it won’t sell in this upcoming, notice I said upcoming, we haven’t gotten there yet market. They will have in their minds that it was worth x amount in mid 2020-early 2022 mentality. I can see the vintage market as slightly lower but mostly stagnate with little to no change over the next few years. The past two years of growth were ridiculous and unsustainable to continue.

Hold on tight.

It’s never as good as it seems and it’s never as bad as it seems.

It’s gonna vary. Some stuff is gonna crater (overproduced modern). Last place I'd want to be right now is holding a stack of shiny crap basketball. Ditto all of the mainstream postwar PSA 7-8 level cards. I'm selling off everything marginal at that level except for the guys I really collect (Aaron, Koufax, Ryan, etc.) or the cards i got when I was a kid. At the depth of the last go-round I was picking up that sort of stuff for as low as $1.99 a card, slabbed. Made really nice profits turning those out during the bubble.

Some stuff won’t budge. A T206 Wagner isn’t gonna fall because the market for it is like the art market: people with so much money that inflation and recession are just gnat bites. Absolute rarities too. A card with a handful of examples will be a hold and you will be able to name your price. As always. I have never been squeamish about those kinds of cards because I know that there are buyers.

The squeeze will be in the middle. Abundant stuff will take a hit. Even the good stuff. I'd guess that a 40%-60% decline is in store for most mainstream cards that are basically demand driven. Personally, I am looking forward to a nice, fat decline on some cards. 1959 Topps Bob Gibson, you will be mine again!

The other thing that won't be affected--that will in fact do well--are cheap vintage cards. The dollar boxes. Collectors need their fixes. During the last one the dollar boxes were where all the action was at the shows.

The real question for me is what is a long term keeper. I think a well curated collection emphasizing top players and rare cards will be a great performer as long as you’ve gotten in well below the peak. Even a marquee card is a bad buy at the wrong price. The question is whether I want to play the arbitrage game with a card by selling it now and hoping to repurchase it after the decline. I am disinclined to do that with cards I always dreamt of owning: to finally get one that presents nicely, I am happy to own it for a decade or more. If it goes up a bunch in ten years, fantastic. I can seem really prescient and smart. If it doesn't, I can play with it until I am food for worms. Either works for me. Owning a great card isn't like taking a position in a stock. I can't play with 100 shares of Tesla but I can sure as hell play with my cards:

https://photos.imageevent.com/exhibi...ize/img228.jpg

Great post. On the sell and hope to purchase later dilemma. It’s tough because eBay/PayPal fees and/or taxes eat up with a big chunk.